Speaker 1: The Season with Peter Scheger is a production of the
Speaker 1: NFL in partnership with iHeartRadio. What's up, everybody, This is
Speaker 1: Peter Scheger. This is the Season with Peter Schrager. And
Speaker 1: it is the third Tuesday in May.
Speaker 2: When we're recording this.
Speaker 1: And I'll tell you, usually this is like the dark
Speaker 1: dead time of the NFL offseason anything. But I'm joined
Speaker 1: here by my producer, Aaron wang Kauffman. Aaron, the league
Speaker 1: meeting is going on right now, and it is not
Speaker 1: the one in March. It's the one in Man. Usually
Speaker 1: the one in March is where all the big news
Speaker 1: comes out. But yesterday there was a few news items
Speaker 1: that I'm going to run through at the listeners, and
Speaker 1: I want to get your thoughts on one of them.
Speaker 2: First off, the Super Bowl.
Speaker 1: In a few years then Mech's site is going to
Speaker 1: be in San Francisco, Santa Clara. It's going to be
Speaker 1: at Levi Stadium at Super Bowl sixties.
Speaker 2: That's news number two.
Speaker 1: The Draft, which has been a great sensation for so
Speaker 1: many of these host cities that aren't getting Super Bowls
Speaker 1: in the near future. Next year's is in Detroit. That's
Speaker 1: been decided already the following year has been announced that
Speaker 1: it's going to be in green Bay.
Speaker 2: Interesting.
Speaker 1: Let me get your thoughts to someone who just got
Speaker 1: back from Kansas City for the draft green Bay. Let's see,
Speaker 1: three hundred thousand people came to Kansas City for the draft.
Speaker 1: There are one hundred thousand residents of Green Bay. There
Speaker 1: are not a ton of hotel options, and yet it
Speaker 1: is a football mecha. Your reaction to green Bay as
Speaker 1: the choice for the NFL for the draft.
Speaker 3: Well, someone who went to school in Minnesota and loves
Speaker 3: the Midwest, I am all for like these smaller Midwest
Speaker 3: cities getting timed to charm people. So I'm all about it.
Speaker 3: I think it'll be It'll be a lot of people
Speaker 3: in a smaller city.
Speaker 1: Though I've been to Green Bay several times for Packers' games.
Speaker 1: You drive up and similar to Buffalo, maybe even more,
Speaker 1: it's a town. It is an intimate setting in that
Speaker 1: there are people's homes.
Speaker 2: Just a stone's throw from lambeau Field.
Speaker 1: There's not a ton of you know, modern hotels where
Speaker 1: they're not there's no four seasons in green Bay, and
Speaker 1: there's no slew of chains.
Speaker 2: I'm curious how they're going to do all that.
Speaker 1: But I also know Peter O'Reilly, who runs the events
Speaker 1: for the NFL, uh has so many ideas and the
Speaker 1: league would not put their full strength behind something if
Speaker 1: they thought it was gonna be a logistical nightmare.
Speaker 2: They will figure it out, all right.
Speaker 1: The controversial news that came out late Monday night, and
Speaker 1: at this point in you know, the NFL news cycle,
Speaker 1: there's few things that are controversial or that are that
Speaker 1: are you know, even debated amongst the owners when it
Speaker 1: comes to like let's take a vote for it, and
Speaker 1: it comes of all things Thursday night Flex scheduling. All right,
Speaker 1: here's what it is. In short, Amazon had this great
Speaker 1: first year. They put a great effort in. They pay
Speaker 1: a ton of money, and Amazon was not assured and
Speaker 1: late games of the season that are gonna be you know,
Speaker 1: total hits. You look at the schedule right now. Weeks
Speaker 1: thirteen to seventeen are all good matchups. They include New
Speaker 1: England and Pittsburgh. They include you know, a Jets Browns game,
Speaker 1: They include big teams, and yet there was no assurance
Speaker 1: that these games are gonna matter late for them paying
Speaker 1: that money and for the quality of the product on television,
Speaker 1: for the viewers at home. The discussion began really during
Speaker 1: the season and kind of bubbled up in March where
Speaker 1: they tabled it should Amazon and the league have the
Speaker 1: right to get flex scheduling rules like we see on
Speaker 1: Sunday Night Football and Monday Night Football for those Thursday
Speaker 1: night matchups, and they needed twenty four votes.
Speaker 2: They didn't have those twenty four votes. It was tabled
Speaker 2: until May.
Speaker 1: Back in March and John Marra, the owner of the Giants,
Speaker 1: came out staunchly against it, on his premise being it's
Speaker 1: for the you know, the fans who pay money to
Speaker 1: go see a game on a Sunday. You buy four tickets, times,
Speaker 1: get a hotel if it's out of town. You invest
Speaker 1: your entire Sunday plan based on a schedule release that
Speaker 1: happened last week, and then you find out that wait
Speaker 1: a second, that game's not on a Sunday and it's
Speaker 1: not being flexed to the night time, which although an inconvenience,
Speaker 1: you can adjust. Maybe you have to buy a new
Speaker 1: flight the next one. Whatever it is. No, this game
Speaker 1: is going to be seventy two hours earlier. It's going
Speaker 1: to actually be on Thursday night. Now.
Speaker 2: Marrow was very outspoken about it.
Speaker 1: I saw Mark Davis was outspoken about it against it. Quietly,
Speaker 1: there were a lot of people who were for it, saying, hey,
Speaker 1: this is good for the product of the game. The
Speaker 1: NBA doesn't have a set scheduled time until a day out.
Speaker 1: People seem to make a work college football. You know
Speaker 1: who you're playing and where, you don't know when the
Speaker 1: time of those games are, and we're a couple of
Speaker 1: months from the start of the season.
Speaker 2: That's been some of the arguments.
Speaker 1: The argument that really struck me, though, was what Jerry
Speaker 1: Jones said in a public comment and said that only
Speaker 1: seven percent of the NFL's fans are ever going to
Speaker 1: step into an NFL stadium, and that ninety three percent
Speaker 1: of NFL fans are watching at home. So whether we
Speaker 1: want to dismiss the fan that pays for the season
Speaker 1: tickets all that, and the owners would swear up and down,
Speaker 1: and the league would swear up and down, and I
Speaker 1: agree they don't want to inconvenience anyone. The best product
Speaker 1: possible on that TV, and the best game possible might
Speaker 1: benefit the fans more from a greater, greater whole.
Speaker 2: I'm not making that argument.
Speaker 1: I thought it was really interesting that, you know, one
Speaker 1: of the key votes was Denver and that's the Penner family,
Speaker 1: and Craig Penner, the new owner of the Broncos, was
Speaker 1: kind of wavering and where are we going to go
Speaker 1: with this thing? And at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: it's the Walmart family that votes yes to assure the
Speaker 1: Amazon family gets this incredible Thursday night deal. Now here's
Speaker 1: part of the stuff that made sure it happened a
Speaker 1: and this is big. Twenty eight days in advance. The
Speaker 1: teams are gonna be notified. So this isn't Sunday Night
Speaker 1: Football where ten days out you're like, you're gonna be
Speaker 1: playing a night game and figure it out twenty eight days.
Speaker 2: I would think the schedule.
Speaker 1: Makers are gonna be really really you know, conservative and
Speaker 1: saying that game is irrelevant four weeks out, especially with
Speaker 1: all those different games and I don't have them up now,
Speaker 1: but they're all good games on paper in May. You know,
Speaker 1: I don't think that's gonna be something where they're gonna
Speaker 1: be rushing to make a change. Second part of it
Speaker 1: from what I hear, and these are come from sources
Speaker 1: and you can aggregate this and do whatever you want,
Speaker 1: Like the Sunday night requirements are gonna be one thing.
Speaker 1: The Monday night requirements to flex a game from Sunday
Speaker 1: to Monday are gonna be a little harder. And I'm
Speaker 1: told that the Sunday flex to Thursday, these two teams
Speaker 1: better be basically winless or have five wins, or it
Speaker 1: just must be a complete, complete bomb of a game.
Speaker 1: And one of the games people are circling are that
Speaker 1: is a Rams Saints game and it's in LA and
Speaker 1: it's Rylands comes to the Rams. They're like, well, that
Speaker 1: there's a chance both those teams think next year and
Speaker 1: there's a chance that games flex out.
Speaker 2: But mind this worth noting that's Christmas weekend. Are you
Speaker 2: really gonna.
Speaker 1: Be so occupied you got to flex out of a
Speaker 1: Christmas weekend Thursday night game and change all these fans.
Speaker 1: Is the NFL gonna say, yeah, I know, Saints fans,
Speaker 1: you bought this ticket for Thursday, but actually that game's
Speaker 1: on a Sunday in LA.
Speaker 2: You gotta figure it out. Sorry, I don't know.
Speaker 1: And the other part of it is the Chargers have
Speaker 1: a Saturday night game that weekend, I believe against the
Speaker 1: Buffalo Bills that's already being played Are you really gonna
Speaker 1: flex a game out from Thursday night and say the
Speaker 1: Chargers are gonna play on Saturday night and the Rams
Speaker 1: are gonna play on Sunday.
Speaker 2: Highly unlikely. So the thresholds and.
Speaker 1: The barriers are different, and they're stacked differently for Sunday
Speaker 1: night flex from a Sunday game, from a Sunday flex
Speaker 1: to a Monday game, from a Sunday game to a
Speaker 1: Thursday night game. I'll be honest, we're here in May.
Speaker 1: If there's more than one, I'd be shocked. Aaron your
Speaker 1: thoughts on the Thursday night deal, and we didn't even
Speaker 1: get into the player safety and some of the real
Speaker 1: concerns there.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I'm looking at the games right now.
Speaker 3: So just going from week thirteen on, we have Seahawks
Speaker 3: at Cowboys. That should be a great game.
Speaker 1: They're not flexing the Cowboys. Sorry, I'm drinking my coffee.
Speaker 1: They're not ever flexing the Cowboys. Amazon is not like,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, take the Cowboys away, go on.
Speaker 2: Like you said.
Speaker 3: Week fourteen is Pats at Steelers. There's I could see
Speaker 3: that being a really exciting game, especially.
Speaker 1: Steelers national brand Belichick face of the league. They're never
Speaker 1: gonna well, I shouldn't say never, doubtful.
Speaker 3: Go on week fifteen, Chargers at Raiders. That seems like
Speaker 3: two teams that will be somewhat relevant and be competing for,
Speaker 3: you know, seating.
Speaker 1: Justin Herbert and the Chargers six different primetime games. The
Speaker 1: NFL is banking on that team being a big game.
Speaker 1: And you know, again, Amazon, they say, we don't want
Speaker 1: Justin Arbor given us someone else.
Speaker 2: No, I don't see it.
Speaker 3: Sixteen is that Saints at Rams game you were talking about,
Speaker 3: and then seventeen is Jets Browns and that's another game
Speaker 3: that could have huge playoff implications. So I mean, I
Speaker 3: think it's good in the sense that, hey, if Aaron Rodgers,
Speaker 3: god forbid, gets hurt and has to miss the entire season,
Speaker 3: yeah maybe then things will be different. But I'm not
Speaker 3: looking at any of these Thursday night football games like
Speaker 3: I don't want to watch that. So these all look good.
Speaker 1: I don't think it's it's as big of a deal
Speaker 1: as as you know, the media is making it out
Speaker 1: to be right now, and the same people and this
Speaker 1: is my here's my you know, my moment. I know
Speaker 1: I work for this shield, but the same people who
Speaker 1: moan about the you know, this.
Speaker 2: Game sucks, Why is this? Why is this on? Why
Speaker 2: am I watching this?
Speaker 1: You know, are going to be the same people that say,
Speaker 1: well that you can't do flex, so just take it
Speaker 1: for what it's worth and let's see. Let's see it
Speaker 1: for a year, and it's only a one year deal,
Speaker 1: and it might be a colossal disaster and they might
Speaker 1: flex out one of these games and then one of
Speaker 1: the teams wasn't prepared and they're knocked out of the
Speaker 1: playoffs because of injuries and whoever knows in twenty eight
Speaker 1: days in advance, and they were playing Thursday and Sunday,
Speaker 1: and it was just too much quick of a turnaround
Speaker 1: from Sunday to Thursday. I get it. All that stuff. Really,
Speaker 1: that's why eight teams voted against it, and that's why
Speaker 1: everyone's up in arms. But I would say, let's give
Speaker 1: it a year and let's see and realize that, you know,
Speaker 1: the media partners, they pay a lot of money, and
Speaker 1: it sounds like, you know, for the better of the
Speaker 1: entertainment product on the on the couch as opposed to
Speaker 1: the fans in the stadium that tipped the scales real quick.
Speaker 1: Before we get to our guest, which is a different
Speaker 1: kind of guest for us, and I'm curious see how
Speaker 1: it goes. I wanted to talk real quick about the
Speaker 1: biggest sensation right now in football stadiums around the country,
Speaker 1: and I'm not talking about OTAs and I'm not talking
Speaker 1: about this Taylor Swift thing is legit, man, Like I
Speaker 1: said before, we got on air, and we've got our
Speaker 1: friend Jason English from iHeart here as well and Aaron.
Speaker 1: I have never never, in all my years working for
Speaker 1: the NFL gotten so many texts from friends in the
Speaker 1: industry outside the industry. Got one from a guy who
Speaker 1: you know, knows me sort of way, not close enough
Speaker 1: to even ask this. Hey, bro, I know you're tight
Speaker 1: with the Jets. I know you're tight with the Giants. Bro,
Speaker 1: I know you work for the NFL. I'm sure there's
Speaker 1: a sweet I'm sure is there any way to get
Speaker 1: tickets to these Taylor Swift concerts?
Speaker 2: I did not see this coming.
Speaker 1: I did maybe I am just it's a gap in
Speaker 1: my pop culture knowledge. I had no idea Taylor Swift
Speaker 1: is as huge as she is. To the fact that
Speaker 1: I'm not talking one friend, two friends, I'm talking best
Speaker 1: friends who know who do want to ask me for
Speaker 1: Super Bowl tickets.
Speaker 2: They don't ask me for Giants.
Speaker 1: Raiders in the middle of September where they would love
Speaker 1: to take their son because it's just too big of
Speaker 1: an asks weird. The text always started this, I know
Speaker 1: it's a long shot and I feel awful asking, but
Speaker 1: do you have any The answer is I don't.
Speaker 2: I have made calls.
Speaker 1: I called Robert Sala, I called Joe Shane, I called
Speaker 1: the PR guy from the Jets, Eric Gelfind. I've called
Speaker 1: several people just to see, Hey, everyone's willing to pay
Speaker 1: face value, probably more. And the answer is a hearty
Speaker 1: laugh from all them. There is nothing we can do.
Speaker 1: And it's not because they don't hook ups. The tickets
Speaker 1: today they're all spoken for, Aaron, did you have any idea?
Speaker 1: Taylor Swift is the sensation that she is And there's
Speaker 1: been trends pieces about the dads wearing all this stuff
Speaker 1: and it's it's become a whole thing. Every weekend at
Speaker 1: a different football stadium. Met life is Memorial Day weekend
Speaker 1: and I am zero for twenty with friends asking me
Speaker 1: for tickets. What do you say?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, she's beyond huge, like no one else
Speaker 3: I think really at this point could have a tour
Speaker 3: like that. I have friends who went through the whole
Speaker 3: ticket pre sale fiasco where they were trying to sign
Speaker 3: up and use credit card. You sign up for a
Speaker 3: credit card to get early access and didn't get the
Speaker 3: ticket still and now have this credit card. And I
Speaker 3: personally am not like a huge Taylor Swift fan, like.
Speaker 1: Are you apathetic or like not a fan like to
Speaker 1: the point where I know all her songs, like I
Speaker 1: just wouldn't buy a ticket, or are you like I
Speaker 1: don't know if you want to upset?
Speaker 2: Like there's the Beehive with Beyonce, like are we doing this?
Speaker 1: So I personally like, I'm shooter.
Speaker 2: I just can't go.
Speaker 4: No.
Speaker 3: She has some really great pop songs. I think I
Speaker 3: don't like her lyrics generally, Like she has a song
Speaker 3: where she rhymes cardigan and car again, and I think
Speaker 3: that's lazy. She has incredible pop songs. She's worked with
Speaker 3: some incredible artists, and there are songs of hers that
Speaker 3: I love, but I'm not like, oh, every single song
Speaker 3: I love, love Love, So yeah.
Speaker 1: I think I was starting off because I imagine, you know, okay,
Speaker 1: Beyonce's on tour.
Speaker 2: Everyone goes and sees it.
Speaker 1: I would think, like Lady gagas on to where everyone
Speaker 1: goes and sees it, and then you got like your
Speaker 1: old heads, like Bruce is at the you know we're
Speaker 1: going and everyone's going to see Springsteen or even Dave
Speaker 1: Matthews too. I guess that's really dating me, Dave Matthews.
Speaker 1: But I've never in my life seen something like this
Speaker 1: Taylor Swift thing. So Taylor, if you're listening to the
Speaker 1: season with Peter Schrager, you're welcome to be a guest.
Speaker 1: Aaron will call him sick that day, we'll fill in
Speaker 1: for a different producer. I appreciate your music. I think
Speaker 1: you're pretty good. I dig it, I think you're fine.
Speaker 1: I like it. So I won't be going to the concert,
Speaker 1: and nowhere will any of my friends who asked for
Speaker 1: tickets because I couldn't hook him up.
Speaker 2: And I feel kind of bad about that.
Speaker 1: Aaron our guest. I'm super excited. One of my favorite comedians,
Speaker 1: one of my favorite actors in the mini shows and
Speaker 1: movies he's been in. But I don't know him. I
Speaker 1: don't know if he likes football. I don't know if
Speaker 1: he knows who I am, and that makes for really
Speaker 1: good spontaneous podcasting. Actor comedian David Cross is up next.
Speaker 1: All right, As I mentioned the monologue, huge fan of
Speaker 1: this guy, have long been just an admirer from afar.
Speaker 1: And when Aaron and Jason we got to the off
Speaker 1: season of the NFL season and said, let's have a
Speaker 1: lot more guests who aren't necessarily NFL coaches or players
Speaker 1: general managers. Who do you want? And I said, I
Speaker 1: want X y Z And one of the names was
Speaker 1: David Cross, who I have just I just I'm a
Speaker 1: huge fan of And sure enough I was blown away.
Speaker 2: We got an.
Speaker 1: Email response back saying, yeah, David Cross is willing to
Speaker 1: join you guys, actor comedian, a long time guy who's
Speaker 1: been entertaining you for years. David Cross, Welcome to the
Speaker 1: Peter Schrager The Season with Peter Schrager podcast.
Speaker 4: Thank you. Yeah, usually it's an actor comedian bon vivant.
Speaker 4: So if you want to add that, maybe go back.
Speaker 1: And you know, I think that's what I ultimately want
Speaker 1: to do with my life. Yeah, Like I want to
Speaker 1: be able to say bomb and what are the end
Speaker 1: to just launch see a show at night, just go
Speaker 1: to a gallery, like, what do you what is the
Speaker 1: life of a bon vivant?
Speaker 4: You think you know, it's a lot of air ballooning,
Speaker 4: and it's a lot of charity work for animals with
Speaker 4: only three legs. And you know, I'm I'm really deeply
Speaker 4: ensconced in the fashion industry. I do just cuffs. I
Speaker 4: do a lot of different cuffs, and I only do cuffs,
Speaker 4: and it's just all kinds. It's it's crazy, it's all
Speaker 4: over the place. But you know, it's a it's a
Speaker 4: tough but enriching lifestyle.
Speaker 1: It's good. Look, your career goes through obviously arrested development
Speaker 1: and and your stand up career. But I started with
Speaker 1: Mister Show, and that's where I think, you know, I started.
Speaker 1: Night Live is always there. But then when Mister Show
Speaker 1: came with you and Bob oden Kirk, it totally broke
Speaker 1: the mold. And I think anyone who's a fan of
Speaker 1: comedy and comedians today, especially in the sketch world, will
Speaker 1: point to that as you know, such a groundbreaker. Do
Speaker 1: you still get that, I mean, do you do you
Speaker 1: get that being stopped for you? Like, do people still
Speaker 1: stop you mister Show? Or now we're so many years
Speaker 1: remove where they you don't get that as much.
Speaker 4: You know, sure, Like I mean, it's you know, it's
Speaker 4: all over the place. Some people have no idea about
Speaker 4: mister Show, don't know, don't even know it existed, but
Speaker 4: they know me from these other things. And other people
Speaker 4: know mister Show but don't know the other things. So
Speaker 4: it all depends. But I still definitely get a lot,
Speaker 4: and I'm on tour currently and so meet a lot
Speaker 4: of people who are bringing in kind of mister Show. Yeah,
Speaker 4: minusha that or what a femura I guess is the
Speaker 4: right word. Things that I've forgotten all about, Like Okay,
Speaker 4: can you sign this, you know, weird hockey stick model
Speaker 4: thing I made? It's from the whatever sketch and like,
Speaker 4: I don't remember, I'll sign it, bring it over.
Speaker 1: Uh, you know. I listened to Odin Kirk had his
Speaker 1: his memoir that came out last year.
Speaker 2: Listened to the audiobook and I loved it.
Speaker 1: And he takes us through the origin of that show
Speaker 1: and this like HBO and then taking a risk on
Speaker 1: you guys, Can you take us through it from your
Speaker 1: your lens? Like here, you guys are obviously established sketch guys,
Speaker 1: and you've got different paths, but to come together and
Speaker 1: be given that kind of platform on HBO at that age,
Speaker 1: what was it like?
Speaker 4: Well, I mean it was amazing and life altering. And
Speaker 4: I was not nearly as established as Bob was. I.
Speaker 4: Bob was on SNL briefly and then he was a
Speaker 4: big part of The Ben Stiller Show as an actor
Speaker 4: and a writer. But I was just a writer and
Speaker 4: I was brought on midway through and Bob and I
Speaker 4: started working together just doing shows in La just you know,
Speaker 4: with our friends, for our friends. With no we didn't
Speaker 4: have an eye towards the future. Bob did eventually more
Speaker 4: than I did. I was still like, well, let's get
Speaker 4: drunk and have fun, and Bob's it was more focused.
Speaker 4: And then we were doing these shows and they were clear,
Speaker 4: very very successful immediately, like people in the audience really
Speaker 4: liked them, and it started to become a thing where
Speaker 4: it was it felt like an event, like you wanted
Speaker 4: to go to these shows when we put them on.
Speaker 4: And then Bob, through his manager Bernie Berlstein, we started
Speaker 4: bringing you know, and also there was a little bit
Speaker 4: of buzz so ABC is there and HBO's coming and.
Speaker 1: Set the stage first, Is it like one of these
Speaker 1: like small clubs, like I know that Luna Lounge is
Speaker 1: like a big thing that everyone talks about, Like, is
Speaker 1: it like one of those like small cafes. You guys
Speaker 1: are doing a little underground and then all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: why is Lorne Michael's in the crowd?
Speaker 2: Like that kind of dude?
Speaker 4: It was even better than that. It was. It was
Speaker 4: this place on Sunset right off of Librea called the
Speaker 4: Diamond Club, and it was it was this cheesy, like
Speaker 4: super cheesy Hollywood club where you know, it's like half
Speaker 4: as people or people who had just moved to La
Speaker 4: who were way too much makeup and clone and stuff,
Speaker 4: and then half like Russian and Eastern European and Armenian
Speaker 4: dudes and like we you know, just that kind of crowd.
Speaker 4: And then so there's this club right it's like at
Speaker 4: disco dance club and in the back, like if you
Speaker 4: walk through this thing while everybody's dancing whatever, there's a
Speaker 4: side room and it probably had a little stage, and
Speaker 4: I think it held I'm going to guess at the
Speaker 4: most it held maybe one hundred and twenty people at tops.
Speaker 4: And that's where we start doing these shows. There's a
Speaker 4: guy named Dave Wrath who was Now he's a huge,
Speaker 4: big time manager, but he was a huge fan of
Speaker 4: comedy and very helpful and manager at the time for
Speaker 4: all kinds of like people that are very famous now
Speaker 4: that and most of the people in that scene. And we,
Speaker 4: as I said, we were just doing shows with each
Speaker 4: other for each other and we would all have a
Speaker 4: different night and you know, we were a very tight
Speaker 4: group and you know, it had there was everybody from
Speaker 4: and a lot of musicians too, so like Maynard Keenan
Speaker 4: and Jack Black would be hanging out and we all
Speaker 4: used played with each other, you know, and and so
Speaker 4: that's it was just a weird because you had to
Speaker 4: go through that other.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the Eastern European Nightclub a.
Speaker 4: Little room in the back and it was it was
Speaker 4: really it was really funny, but it was cool, you know,
Speaker 4: and it was like a cheap We got a space
Speaker 4: and we just did these shows and.
Speaker 1: You put these shows on. And we've had Paul Rudd
Speaker 1: on this podcast and I've gotten to know him just
Speaker 1: living in the neighborhood and he talks like with great
Speaker 1: lore about those years in la and like going into
Speaker 1: being told Hey, TENACIOUSD are performing at this place at
Speaker 1: this time, and like just the entire everyone who is
Speaker 1: anyone would be there and it was like going to
Speaker 1: that was kind of the the buzz around mister show
Speaker 1: as well. And then HBO says, we're going to give
Speaker 1: you guys a progress and what was that like, We're
Speaker 1: going to go and do this on the Home Box
Speaker 1: Office after you know, whatever show was on before you.
Speaker 1: I don't know if Sex and the City or Dream
Speaker 1: On whatever else was on at the time, but you know.
Speaker 4: What, I think it was dream On Ben Be. It was.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 4: Yeah, there wasn't a whole lot back then, and we
Speaker 4: were part of their you know, the comedy block with
Speaker 4: Chris Rock and there's some other stuff. And they said
Speaker 4: to us, they were very specific about we don't want TV,
Speaker 4: we don't want regular stuff that's going to be we
Speaker 4: don't want SNL and we were not interested in that
Speaker 4: kind of thing at all, and uh, and they encouraged
Speaker 4: us to, you know, do what you want to do.
Speaker 4: And we in four years, we only got one note
Speaker 4: that we had to take kind of a standards and
Speaker 4: practices note. That was it. And uh, they were very
Speaker 4: I mean, there's a complete lead new regime there now.
Speaker 4: But the people that we were working with that ushered
Speaker 4: us in were really helpful, really amenable. And again, I
Speaker 4: mean it was a cheap show to make. I mean
Speaker 4: we barely got anything, and we made it look better
Speaker 4: than it actually should have looked for the budget we had.
Speaker 4: And you know, we were what Friday at twelve thirty
Speaker 4: in the morning or something like that, so it wasn't
Speaker 4: we didn't have to do much to attain success for
Speaker 4: that kind of slot at that time with that budget,
Speaker 4: and you know we were critically successful and that's kind
Speaker 4: of all they wanted. So it was a good deal.
Speaker 4: And yeah, it was great.
Speaker 2: You know, the aresa development gig.
Speaker 1: The story that is like urban legend or maybe true
Speaker 1: you can confirm it is that you were dating a
Speaker 1: young woman and you got this audition out in LA
Speaker 1: and he said, I'll go for one day, but this
Speaker 1: girl's in New York. I'm not going to be moving
Speaker 1: my life out to LA. I'll try out for arrested development.
Speaker 1: I'll just do it, see where it goes. You get
Speaker 1: the job, and the rest is history. Tell us, really
Speaker 1: the story and what really went down and when you
Speaker 1: walked into is that is that a.
Speaker 4: Good or it was? So the context to it was
Speaker 4: I had been in LA for nine and a half years.
Speaker 4: I moved there from Boston. And my joke, which was
Speaker 4: based in truth, was like I moved to LA to
Speaker 4: make enough money to move away from LA, you know,
Speaker 4: which is I eventually after being there for nine and
Speaker 4: a half years, and I had a bit of a
Speaker 4: pause in work and I realized because I'd been saying
Speaker 4: for years, like I want to get out of here.
Speaker 4: I want to go to New York. And I had
Speaker 4: this break where I had nothing coming up, and I
Speaker 4: was like, I don't leave right now. I'm going to
Speaker 4: wait here another month and then another job will come
Speaker 4: and I'll be here for another two years. So I
Speaker 4: took this opportunity and moved to And I didn't have
Speaker 4: a lot of possessions. I still don't, I never did,
Speaker 4: but I moved, put all this stuff in a one
Speaker 4: of those little U haul things, moved to New York,
Speaker 4: had a great time uh York and UH and doing
Speaker 4: stand up and stuff. And then I met this woman
Speaker 4: who we had a really good relationship and it eventually
Speaker 4: lasted for like three and a half years. We're still friends.
Speaker 4: And our kids play together. But you know, we were
Speaker 4: in the in the midst of it, and I got
Speaker 4: an offer for rested development and I didn't even look
Speaker 4: at the script. I wasn't interested.
Speaker 2: It was like, there's no way, no audition.
Speaker 1: Nothing they offered you is like guy.
Speaker 4: Initially they wanted me to look at job and I
Speaker 4: and I read the script and I did not have
Speaker 4: a handle on job at all. And once you see
Speaker 4: will Arnett our net, it's and I did not have
Speaker 4: a handle on it. But Tobias, who was meant to
Speaker 4: be a you know, uh, part time I'm forgetting whatever
Speaker 4: the phrase is, you know, but not a full time
Speaker 4: cast guest star. Yeah, like a you know, six out
Speaker 4: of eighteen episodes kind of thing, which already was appealing,
Speaker 4: like oh, I'll just fly to LA We're not going
Speaker 4: to one or two episodes out and go home. But
Speaker 4: also beyond that, I just immediately knew who that character
Speaker 4: was and and had a sense for it, and I
Speaker 4: said can I And I was talking to Bitch for
Speaker 4: Wits and the Russo brothers, the directors, and we were
Speaker 4: talking on the phone because I said, I'm not I
Speaker 4: don't you know, I'll do it if it's part time.
Speaker 4: I just can't and they were like, yeah, that's great,
Speaker 4: that's meant to be part time. And then I came
Speaker 4: out to shoot the pilot, which was you know, you
Speaker 4: always take longer to shoot the pilot, and I was
Speaker 4: probably like a ten day shoot, and I realized around
Speaker 4: the third day that it's really something special. This is
Speaker 4: just from the pilot. And the cast was amazing, the
Speaker 4: dialogue was great, the direct it was fun. They let
Speaker 4: us play around and improvise. And I called my girlfriend
Speaker 4: from the little bridge thing that's in the Beverly what's
Speaker 4: across from the Beverly Center, the Beverly Connection, right across
Speaker 4: the street is a smaller one. I was up on
Speaker 4: this little bridge thing and I called her and I
Speaker 4: was like, hey, so good news, bad news, And I
Speaker 4: basically said I have to do this. Yeah, and you
Speaker 4: know it's really special and so yeah, I think I
Speaker 4: could speak for everybody that we all felt that thing
Speaker 4: when we were shooting it, like this is something special.
Speaker 1: I mean, such a cool cast. And obviously Sarah is
Speaker 1: a kid at the time, and you know, you got
Speaker 1: obviously Baiton and Arnett and all go through it. It's
Speaker 1: every story you hear, and I know that Bateman obviously
Speaker 1: has the SmartLess podcast where we talk about it off
Speaker 1: and with our nett It's like, it seems like it
Speaker 1: was just a really fun time and you guys had
Speaker 1: a blast, And isn't that the best working environment you
Speaker 1: could possibly imagine?
Speaker 2: Just a fun experience working.
Speaker 4: And I'm at the place I'm and I even before
Speaker 4: I was at the place, I guess I just always
Speaker 4: had the attitude. I do not want to work on
Speaker 4: anything that's not fun, you know, unless it's going to
Speaker 4: pay a crazy amount of money. But my whole life
Speaker 4: is too short. I just want to have fun. I
Speaker 4: want to be able to play around and be in
Speaker 4: a set that is there's laughter and joy, and that
Speaker 4: SAT always had, you know, there was a lot of laps,
Speaker 4: a lot of laps on that, and it was a
Speaker 4: really fun privilege that a lot of actors don't get
Speaker 4: to have, you.
Speaker 1: Know, And look at that show. And again, now you've
Speaker 1: got mister Show and you've got a rest development. You're
Speaker 1: stacking these huge hit shows that everyone loves, cult favorite
Speaker 1: one of them, the other one is a massive mainstream favorite.
Speaker 1: All this stuff, and yet you're still on the road
Speaker 1: and you still do the stand up comedy and you're
Speaker 1: on tour right now, and I'm sure the audience comes
Speaker 1: for all of it and they come from all the corners.
Speaker 1: But the life on the road, I mean, you've got
Speaker 1: your father like it is. It is a grind, and
Speaker 1: yet you're still doing it. Do you have a passion
Speaker 1: for it or is this one of those things where
Speaker 1: you're like, it's just in my blood that I've got
Speaker 1: to be.
Speaker 4: On the road.
Speaker 2: It's just what I do. I'm a stand up comedian.
Speaker 4: It's I mean, it's both. It's uh, it's I had
Speaker 4: this revelation not too long ago that I was talking
Speaker 4: to my wife about it, like I've realized, I'm I
Speaker 4: do all these things. I do, I write, I act,
Speaker 4: I produce a direct, I do stand up, but I've realized, like, oh,
Speaker 4: I'm a I'm a stand up Those other things are
Speaker 4: fun things to do. But I'm I think it. I
Speaker 4: felt it when I had to cancel the last tour
Speaker 4: that I was going to do because of COVID and
Speaker 4: I had the set was already and I was looking
Speaker 4: forward to going out and h and then had to
Speaker 4: cancel it, and it and it hit me more more
Speaker 4: than I expected it to. Was really disappointing, really, and
Speaker 4: I miss it and I and I'm out on the
Speaker 4: road now, and as you said, it's a grind, and
Speaker 4: it kind of you know, I used to go out
Speaker 4: and I have the whole family, or before I had
Speaker 4: a daughter, just go out and have a tour bus
Speaker 4: and it was easy. And because my daughter's in school
Speaker 4: and I want to be here as much as I can,
Speaker 4: I basically am going out, you know, three or four days,
Speaker 4: and then I'm home for three or four days and
Speaker 4: I'm out for the weekends and you know, Thursday through
Speaker 4: Sunday whatever. And it's it's hard because you just got
Speaker 4: some ear either in a car for six hours my
Speaker 4: next gig the next morning, or you're getting up and
Speaker 4: you're in a small airport making a connector through Charlotte
Speaker 4: to get to Omaha or whatever, and that part is
Speaker 4: a grind. And you know, I do an hour and
Speaker 4: a half and then I'm doing these meet and greets later,
Speaker 4: so I'm white by the end. I drink a lot.
Speaker 4: I can't not in an alcoholic way, I just in
Speaker 4: a I can't stop drinking. So yeah, it's it is
Speaker 4: a grind, but I love it. I love I love
Speaker 4: this set I'm doing now. It's probably my favorite set
Speaker 4: I've done in a long time. And what we've done
Speaker 4: like forty two shows, I think, and we've got another
Speaker 4: thirty five or so. I'm gonna take the summer off,
Speaker 4: but then I'm back in September October and I'll go
Speaker 4: to Europe for a little bit. And it's the thing
Speaker 4: that if we lived in some weird world where they're like,
Speaker 4: you can't do pick one thing, you had to pick
Speaker 4: one thing, it would definitely be stand up.
Speaker 1: Let me ask you, as a stand up for many
Speaker 1: years without kids and without children, and would you ever
Speaker 1: roll your eyes at like here's my parenting set or
Speaker 1: here's my bit on kids youth sports.
Speaker 2: And then now it's like, oh.
Speaker 1: No, no, I totally get it, and like that is
Speaker 1: where I'm going with this stuff because everyone can relate.
Speaker 4: Oh, I mean I would only roll my eyes at
Speaker 4: like an hour of that. I hate those those things,
Speaker 4: like I would the idea of like an evening of
Speaker 4: comedy about being a parent is that sounds awful? And
Speaker 4: I have, you know, I have plenty of jokes or
Speaker 4: bits or observations about having a kid that I well,
Speaker 4: I have because I have a kid. But I mean
Speaker 4: that's probably no more than thirty percent of my set.
Speaker 4: And it's really about other things. It's not about simply
Speaker 4: like my kid did this thing and no, no, no,
Speaker 4: it's really about the things around it. You know.
Speaker 1: You grew up in Georgia. Yeah, football allegiances college and
Speaker 1: pro would be what well.
Speaker 4: Pros the Falcons. Of course I was going to. I
Speaker 4: was gonna I know this isn't this is just audio,
Speaker 4: but I was gonna wear my one off limited edition ABC.
Speaker 1: Steve Barkowski, who were rolling with what do we got?
Speaker 1: What are we talking about?
Speaker 2: Matt Ryan?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, I he was not the issue with
Speaker 4: that team, and it's true he wasn't. And I really
Speaker 4: I've gotten a lot of arguments. Yeah, it was a
Speaker 4: big Steve Barkowski fan. You know, there hasn't been a
Speaker 4: whole lot to be excited about as a Falcons fan,
Speaker 4: but cautiously optimistic about the coming years, you know, yes,
Speaker 4: Desmond does and you know, we'll see.
Speaker 1: It's cool like the Falcons fandum is like you've had
Speaker 1: this Super Bowl year in ninety nine where it's kind
Speaker 1: of out of nowhere and it's a dirty bird and
Speaker 1: all that. And then at twenty sixteen with Matt Ryan,
Speaker 1: he goes and wins the MVP, and obviously the super
Speaker 1: Bowl goes as it goes.
Speaker 2: We don't have to go down that road.
Speaker 1: It's funny you say, Matt Ryan he just retired or
Speaker 1: he's taking a job at CBS. He might come back,
Speaker 1: He's gonna be an announcer. And we had a debate
Speaker 1: on our morning show on NFL Network. Is Matt Ryan underappreciated?
Speaker 1: And my case is he's been wildly underappreciate because the
Speaker 1: first thing out of everyone's mouth is twenty eight to three,
Speaker 1: how he lost Super Bowl, not the fact he was
Speaker 1: an MVP and a starting quarterback in the league for
Speaker 1: fifteen straight years. One of the hardest things to do
Speaker 1: is durability.
Speaker 4: He didn't lose the Super Bowl, the choice to pass
Speaker 4: three times Super Bowl, the head coaching lost defense. I mean,
Speaker 4: it's a team sport, but would I would totally blame
Speaker 4: the coaching on that. I mean, that was crazy. We
Speaker 4: all sat there going, what the Yeah, that's not Matt
Speaker 4: Ryan's fault. And the only knock I can give Matt
Speaker 4: Ryan is he's you know, not very mobile, right and shut,
Speaker 4: and in this in the certainly the latter half of
Speaker 4: his career that there was a shift to that kind
Speaker 4: of quarterback and offense, and it was like he straddled
Speaker 4: two generations in a way. But again, like I said,
Speaker 4: he was not the problem or certainly not the sole
Speaker 4: problem of that team, and getting rid of him for
Speaker 4: Marcus Mariota is like, Okay, what did you why? What
Speaker 4: what are you doing? And you didn't get anything? Yeah,
Speaker 4: I mean he's he's underappreciated certainly in that context.
Speaker 1: You know, Yeah, did you have college football? I know
Speaker 1: it's a huge college football time. You were what Roswell
Speaker 1: Georgia is where you from?
Speaker 4: Yeah? I mean I didn't. I wanted to go to
Speaker 4: Uga and all my friends went to Uga after high school,
Speaker 4: but I wasn't accepted there. It actually became the premise
Speaker 4: of a mister show bit. That's a real thing. The guy,
Speaker 4: this guy Moe Phelps, who's dead, but he was a
Speaker 4: dean of admissions, and this whole thing became a mister
Speaker 4: show bit where we quote him for real what he
Speaker 4: told me about going to Uga, and because I drove
Speaker 4: up there to have it, what did he say? He
Speaker 4: asked me what. Uh. And this is after you know,
Speaker 4: they won the Sugar Bowl. There was a championship with
Speaker 4: herschel Walker and everything. And he's like, you know what
Speaker 4: did what do you want to major in? And I
Speaker 4: said acting? And he said acting. He's just all southern
Speaker 4: just you know, the old Selden, good old boy a
Speaker 4: ball and short sleeve Polly Astra shirt. You know when
Speaker 4: he goes, uh, what's acting? But just jumping up and
Speaker 4: down on stage and yelling and screaming a lot. And
Speaker 4: you know what, I and I just drove up there,
Speaker 4: you know, and just before Athens was all kindect accessibly
Speaker 4: he had to go through these small towns everything get
Speaker 4: there and paying the ass and and I just I
Speaker 4: was like, I don't I don't know what to say
Speaker 4: to that. There's no I mean, I could say a
Speaker 4: logical response, but it's what kind of conversation would go.
Speaker 1: I was like, okay, did you start list actors like
Speaker 1: there's this guy, Marlon Brando, you know, like these are great.
Speaker 4: It was clear that this was kind of a feudal thing,
Speaker 4: and I know, I just sort of we had another
Speaker 4: probably five minutes of talking. Thank you very much. Please
Speaker 4: consider my application, and then I left. I was like, well,
Speaker 4: they're not gonna me. I ended up taking a year
Speaker 4: off and then going to school in Boston, which was
Speaker 4: just as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it worked out a couple more things and one
Speaker 1: of the deals. It's not like a fun topic, but
Speaker 1: for our listeners who follow the NFL, like the writer's
Speaker 1: strike is going on right now, I saw you were
Speaker 1: out there on the front lines, just top line.
Speaker 2: If you were someone to say, hey, give me the.
Speaker 1: Main points of this, of where the writers are coming from,
Speaker 1: and I know you've been obviously you're not the voice
Speaker 1: of the Writers Union by any chance, of the Writers Guild,
Speaker 1: but just so that we know if the viewers are like,
Speaker 1: where the hell are my favorite shows in the fall?
Speaker 2: What you guys are fighting for?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, very simply put, just fairness, a fair
Speaker 4: A lot of this is not about hey, I want
Speaker 4: you know, one hundred dollars an hour. It's really it's
Speaker 4: much like the last strike in two thousand and eight.
Speaker 4: It's about new technology and new things that have come
Speaker 4: up since the last negotiation that nobody had planned for
Speaker 4: the last time, it was about DVDs, like our writer
Speaker 4: is going to be compensated since all their work is
Speaker 4: coming out on DVD, you know, akin to actors residuals,
Speaker 4: you know. And this time a big part of it
Speaker 4: is about AI and making sure that writers aren't replaced
Speaker 4: by robots. And it's just about fairness, not necessarily right now,
Speaker 4: but before what we are looking for in the future,
Speaker 4: which has always been it's one hundred percent of the time.
Speaker 4: You have to anticipate what is going to happen it's
Speaker 4: ten years from now, and be prepared for it and
Speaker 4: be compensated and just fair. It's just I can't make
Speaker 4: it any more simple than saying it's about fairness. It's
Speaker 4: about paying. Without writers, there's no show, all right. And
Speaker 4: I don't care how many computers you get, you're not
Speaker 4: going to write, you know, Succession and that's all and
Speaker 4: Arrested Development and Severance and all these you know, Breaking
Speaker 4: Bad and Sopranos and all these shows aren't going to
Speaker 4: be written by computers, you know. And and you don't
Speaker 4: have those things without the writer, and the writers, like
Speaker 4: the has always been like the least kind of celebrated
Speaker 4: but arguably the most important part. Nothing exists without the
Speaker 4: concept and the idea and the story and the dialogue
Speaker 4: and all that, and you know, we've never been compensated correctly,
Speaker 4: and this strike is just about getting to the bare
Speaker 4: minimum of fairness. And these studios and the streamers and
Speaker 4: the producers have literally hundreds of billions of dollars and
Speaker 4: they're not willing to. It's the it's the age old
Speaker 4: problem and and so really it's it's about the future.
Speaker 4: It's not about right now. It's not about we want,
Speaker 4: you know, mansion and it's not about that. It's about
Speaker 4: protecting ourselves for what is going to happen to four, six,
Speaker 4: eight years from now.
Speaker 1: It's chilling because you say the AI thing, and I
Speaker 1: think a lot of people who aren't in the room
Speaker 1: are there, like Robot, they're not going to And the
Speaker 1: response from the studios, apparently whatever their union is, was
Speaker 1: we'll revisit it once a year. And you're like, whoa,
Speaker 1: that's not a you know, And that's a chilling response.
Speaker 1: That's scary. The other part is I listen to a
Speaker 1: different podcast in Danny McBride on it yesterday and he said,
Speaker 1: just out of curiosity, he was like, chat GPT make
Speaker 1: a righteous gemstone script and he's like, and it sucked
Speaker 1: He's like, it sucked, and it really sucked.
Speaker 2: And just so you know, the equality will not be
Speaker 2: what you want it to be.
Speaker 4: It's not not even going to be close. Come on,
Speaker 4: it's not. It's it and you know it's so yes,
Speaker 4: it's about protecting ourselves from that because the studio. I mean, look,
Speaker 4: this is a free market, capitalistic society. They're going to
Speaker 4: throw stuff out there. It's why we have so much
Speaker 4: reality TV is because of the two thousand and eight strike,
Speaker 4: and it's way cheaper to produce, and you wouldn't have,
Speaker 4: you know, nineteen versions of vandr.
Speaker 2: Pump Love Island or vander Housewives.
Speaker 4: I mean that may be satisfying and entertaining for some people,
Speaker 4: but other people want a story, you know, and as
Speaker 4: I said, chat Ai is not going to do it.
Speaker 1: You and your wife are both actors. You guys are
Speaker 1: so the thick of it. Like, do you guys still
Speaker 1: find time to watch other shows? Like yeah, is there
Speaker 1: in your Like you're like Successions tonight, Like we're watching.
Speaker 4: Yes, we we are. My wife has to catch up
Speaker 4: from last week's we'll watch tonight. We'll watch the last two.
Speaker 4: But Succession, for sure, I just did season four of
Speaker 4: the Umbrella Academy Cool, which I had I was familiar
Speaker 4: with as like a cultural thing, but I didn't. I'd
Speaker 4: never seen it. I knew people loved it. I knew
Speaker 4: that it was popular, you know, And so I started
Speaker 4: watching it, and like both my wife and I became
Speaker 4: hooked and we're all caught up now. And then I
Speaker 4: got my sister hooked on it, my mom, who's eighty five.
Speaker 4: So we binge watched that. We watched, we watched Succession, Severance,
Speaker 4: waiting patiently for that.
Speaker 1: Patient that if that's your boys still are, tell him like, bro,
Speaker 1: like at.
Speaker 2: Some point like like, let's.
Speaker 4: Got all the writers strike affected them too, you know,
Speaker 4: but they're all pro, right, all these you know, almost
Speaker 4: everybody is pro on the writer's side.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: And oh and Top Chef, big Top Chef fan, really
Speaker 4: big Top Chef fan. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I love it all right, my last one. You've been
Speaker 1: asked about it before. I heard you with Mark Maron
Speaker 1: years ago, and I like loved the competition on it,
Speaker 1: and I've tell you I have Disney Plus it was
Speaker 1: height of the pandemic. You're looking for something, bro, you
Speaker 1: might not want to talk on it. I love the
Speaker 1: Chipmunks movies, dude, and you're great in them and you
Speaker 1: were clever and you're fun.
Speaker 2: And I don't know if you run away from that
Speaker 2: talk or not.
Speaker 4: No, no, I have no. I mean it was.
Speaker 1: I'm you're great in them. You understand that, right, Like
Speaker 1: you're great.
Speaker 4: I when I get hired for something, I will talk
Speaker 4: to the director, producer, whatever, and I assume I bring
Speaker 4: it up, like you guys are hiring me in part
Speaker 4: because I I play around and I be right and
Speaker 4: I offer things up and I improvise and I assume
Speaker 4: that's what you want. And they were no different, and
Speaker 4: it was It wasn't a bad experience. It was just
Speaker 4: sort of an interesting thing. And everybody I worked with
Speaker 4: on the first two films were great. And then the
Speaker 4: third film was I don't know why. I mean, i'll
Speaker 4: write about it.
Speaker 1: Tell me everything.
Speaker 2: I don't know this, so tell me.
Speaker 1: I just know.
Speaker 5: Honestly, I know the first one, and I know the
Speaker 5: squeakl those are my chance.
Speaker 4: Schipwrecked was chip wrecked.
Speaker 1: I never saw chipwreck.
Speaker 4: That don't don't. It would be weird if you did,
Speaker 4: now that your your kids are grown or whatever. Like
Speaker 4: I'm just ha hanging out. Honey, I'm just gonna watch
Speaker 4: chipp tonight.
Speaker 5: So what was the promise plot and tell me take
Speaker 5: us through Chipwreck?
Speaker 4: It was, uh, my character. Well, first of all, I
Speaker 4: know that they're was this really blatant gross product placement
Speaker 4: thing with Carnival Cruise line. It takes place, the whole
Speaker 4: thing for most most of it takes place on a
Speaker 4: carnival cruise in which the people that were on the
Speaker 4: actual people that were on the carnival cruise did not
Speaker 4: know that we were going to be shutting down big
Speaker 4: sections of the cruise.
Speaker 1: Oh you guys, did it rent out the cruise ship?
Speaker 2: You did it while the actual cruise.
Speaker 1: Was going on?
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, yeah. And then I had this slide show
Speaker 4: that I made. I used to do this and it
Speaker 4: was called It's Just Fantasy Versus Reality, So you would
Speaker 4: see I had tons of pictures of the extras and
Speaker 4: set the people who were acting, you know, like they
Speaker 4: took over like the water slide and the pool, the strengths,
Speaker 4: and there are these hot like twenty something early thirties kids,
Speaker 4: and then you just pan over to the real and
Speaker 4: it was just oh boy, it was like the worst
Speaker 4: of the worst of Florida and it was I it
Speaker 4: was really it was.
Speaker 2: Pretty How long was the shoot?
Speaker 4: I think we were on the boat for ten days.
Speaker 4: I think we were shooting for like seven of those days,
Speaker 4: and then there were we were stuck on there and
Speaker 4: there was no That was another thing. They one of
Speaker 4: the first things you get in your room, which is tiny.
Speaker 4: I don't know if you've been on a cruise.
Speaker 2: I've never been on a cruise.
Speaker 4: But there's the first thing. He is this little we
Speaker 4: we got these little packages from production. There's no internet
Speaker 4: on the boat. And if you shift to short calls,
Speaker 4: if you need to make calls, like ninety dollars, so
Speaker 4: you know you're you're kind of on this boat, which
Speaker 4: from from the outside you're like, this is huge, just
Speaker 4: as massive, but only half of that you're looking at
Speaker 4: is accessible, like the rest of it is the inner
Speaker 4: workings of the ocean liner and the and all that stuff.
Speaker 4: So it's it's way more cramped than you would might imagine.
Speaker 4: There's no and if you're a guy like me who
Speaker 4: is one of those like, hey are you famous? Like
Speaker 4: I get that a lot when I'm out. You know,
Speaker 4: people don't know who I am.
Speaker 2: So and then they recognize you, but they just what
Speaker 2: do I know you from?
Speaker 4: One of those and then they just want to know,
Speaker 4: like how do I know you from? And I'm like
Speaker 4: I don't know, no, no tell me. And so it
Speaker 4: was ten days of that where it's like I just
Speaker 4: I just would like to get something to eat. I
Speaker 4: want run through my IMDb page.
Speaker 1: Oh I loved you in the ten Yes, let's talk
Speaker 1: about it. Let's go, Yes, you wish it was that,
Speaker 1: you wish it was that? Oh my gosh, all right,
Speaker 1: and then the movie wraps and you're like, I'm done
Speaker 1: with this or you did have another one after that?
Speaker 4: No, I was contractually obligated to do three, so I did.
Speaker 4: That was my last one. That was. But they also
Speaker 4: treated me very poorly. I don't know why. From the
Speaker 4: very beginning, it was very strange. I was in London
Speaker 4: to do the second series of Todd Margaret and Great
Speaker 4: Decisions Tod Margaret. I don't want to bore everybody with this.
Speaker 4: It's just we don't have to, you know, And I'm
Speaker 4: producing the show. I'm not just you're the guy.
Speaker 1: You're the producer or the actor everything.
Speaker 4: The only reason I say that is to say that
Speaker 4: I was responsible for about sixty jobs, you know, And
Speaker 4: we have been asking for at least a year whether
Speaker 4: I was going to be a part of the third thing,
Speaker 4: because again I'm contractually obligated to do three. And they
Speaker 4: kept saying no, I don't know, and they weren't very
Speaker 4: helpful or forthcoming. And then I will never forget this
Speaker 4: as long as I live. I was it was like Christmas,
Speaker 4: and we're going to start shooting at about I want
Speaker 4: to say four weeks, maybe three weeks, three or four weeks.
Speaker 1: Scripts are done, actors are hired, we're.
Speaker 4: In pre production. We're already, Oh we.
Speaker 1: Have You're in London, You're like, I've.
Speaker 4: Been there for months, and we're We've got sets being
Speaker 4: built and people are hired, and again, you know, responsible
Speaker 4: for roughly sixty jobs, and you know, and a lot
Speaker 4: of these are friends of mine. Now we've we've been
Speaker 4: doing the show. We did the pilot, and we did
Speaker 4: the first series and now we're getting ready to do
Speaker 4: the second. And I was at Herod's with my wife,
Speaker 4: and which is kind of one of our little Christmas
Speaker 4: traditions when we're in London, you go to the food
Speaker 4: hall whatever. We're there, my phone rings and it says
Speaker 4: like the team or uta team or whatever, and oh
Speaker 4: and I just had a bad feeling immediately, you knew.
Speaker 2: Like the agents are calling on Christmas?
Speaker 1: What is going on?
Speaker 4: And I answered the phone and it's and it's David.
Speaker 4: I have She runs through my lawyer, my agent, and
Speaker 4: my So that's only good or bad news, and it's
Speaker 4: never anything in between.
Speaker 1: When you're either in a Marvel movie or something's happening.
Speaker 4: It's either really good news or really bad news. And
Speaker 4: then my manager says, where are you? I explain. He goes, okay,
Speaker 4: can you get somewhere, can you sit down somewhere? I know,
Speaker 4: I know what it is. I know what you do.
Speaker 2: It's been looming in the back of your mind, like
Speaker 2: it's a chance. Yeah yeah.
Speaker 4: And it's a long, boring story, Peter, but it's it's
Speaker 4: it was awful and they were so unpleasant, so weird.
Speaker 4: And then I get the script. Of course, Oh the
Speaker 4: other thing. I will just say this, so not only
Speaker 4: is the movie going, they want me to be in
Speaker 4: Hawaii for rehearsals on January third, and I'm like, you know,
Speaker 4: and my wife's not going on this trip right to
Speaker 4: visit friends in Southern aw who were in the Peace
Speaker 4: Southern in the Peace Cort. Yeah, so we're gonna yeah,
Speaker 4: and and I'm like, I can't. I don't even get back.
Speaker 4: I would have to go I can't even go get
Speaker 4: to Hawaii from London and I have no clothes. I
Speaker 4: would have to go to New York and stop in
Speaker 4: and get proper clothing. And I'm also like, rehearsal, are you.
Speaker 1: The animatronic?
Speaker 4: And then it became clear pretty quickly they're just trying
Speaker 4: to screw, trying to screw. Yeah, And there was this
Speaker 4: whole thing with the trailer, like everybody had a nice trailer,
Speaker 4: like a regular trailer, and I had this moldy, beat
Speaker 4: up like hard thing.
Speaker 2: That was on the on the ship or in Hawaii.
Speaker 4: No, in Hawaii for the rehearsals for and the guys
Speaker 4: saying like that's all. You know, there's a lot of
Speaker 4: production Hawaii, that's all. And it's just clear there with
Speaker 4: me and I've.
Speaker 2: Ah was Jason Lee Was he in that one too?
Speaker 2: Or did he drop out or not?
Speaker 1: He was?
Speaker 4: He was still Dave And you know, we had a
Speaker 4: bunch of scenes together and yeah, and look I did
Speaker 4: I was professional and I did what I do and
Speaker 4: I tried to make it as good as possible. I
Speaker 4: tried to add things and I don't know, I don't
Speaker 4: know what. I'm not sure what their issue was. They
Speaker 4: never were very forthcoming about it. I have no idea.
Speaker 4: But then they withheld a bonus from me.
Speaker 1: Stop now we're getting to it now, I'm angry.
Speaker 4: Yeah, they withhold the bonus that it was supposed to
Speaker 4: get because contractually there was some language in there where
Speaker 4: I did something where I quote unquote disparaged the movie.
Speaker 4: And yeah, they're they're just there. It was strange. It
Speaker 4: was very odd and it's the only only experience I've
Speaker 4: had like that. I've never ever.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you've been in a million things, You've never yeah,
Speaker 5: like beloved, it's amazing.
Speaker 1: Real quick, before we wrap, what do you got going
Speaker 1: on now besides the tour?
Speaker 2: What else is shaken?
Speaker 1: And is there where else can we find you?
Speaker 4: I mean, as I said, the tour is going to
Speaker 4: be Uh, that's that's taken up most of my time.
Speaker 4: And if you want to see the upcoming dates again,
Speaker 4: we're going through October, but it just go to official
Speaker 4: David Cross dot com. That'll have all the dates coming up.
Speaker 4: A couple of places we're hitting again because they sold
Speaker 4: out really quickly. Good and the set has kind of
Speaker 4: evolved since I was there, So like, I'm in Denver
Speaker 4: a week from today, and the.
Speaker 1: Day after Memorial Day, you'll be in Denver.
Speaker 4: And that and that is the second time I'm in
Speaker 4: Denver and we've been doing I'm going back to Chicago
Speaker 4: and so you can take a look on there and
Speaker 4: and also Europe as well.
Speaker 2: Any movies.
Speaker 4: No, oh, yes, what what am I talking about. I
Speaker 4: just went to the screening last night. I'm out of it.
Speaker 4: I'm very tired.
Speaker 1: What's the film?
Speaker 4: You hurt my feelings? And it's really good. It was.
Speaker 4: That was the first time I had seen it, and
Speaker 4: it was really fun to shoot. I enjoyed it a lot.
Speaker 4: It was it was cool. And my wife and I
Speaker 4: play a couple in therapies. And my real wife and
Speaker 4: I Amber Tamblin play a couple that are in therapy,
Speaker 4: couple's therapy with this guy played by Tobias Menzies. We're
Speaker 4: just we're you know, we're supporting cast. It's really Julie
Speaker 4: Louis Dreyfuss and Tobias Menzies and it's a Nicole Hollup
Speaker 4: Center film and it's it's really good. It's really good.
Speaker 4: I enjoyed it.
Speaker 1: Awesome. That's cool.
Speaker 4: And then I'm going to be on Umbrella Academy Season four.
Speaker 4: Super great experience, really great set, really fun character to play,
Speaker 4: and just what a treat and an honor to be
Speaker 4: a part of that show and that experience that they
Speaker 4: were great. And and then also I'll be in Justified Primeval,
Speaker 4: which I don't know when that will be coming out, Okay,
Speaker 4: it's coming out shortly. And that's that's what I got
Speaker 4: in the pipeline. Come out. And again I'll be touring.
Speaker 4: I'm taking the summer off, but I'll be I'm on
Speaker 4: the road until July and then I will be back
Speaker 4: out in September.
Speaker 1: Great, dude, you're awesome. I so appreciate you taking the time.
Speaker 1: And know it's the first time we're meeting. It's always awkward, like, hey,
Speaker 1: good to meet you. We're going live on a podcast
Speaker 1: and an intimate thing about try But I appreciate you
Speaker 1: so much for taking the time, and I hope you
Speaker 1: enjoyed it too.
Speaker 4: I did. I did very much. And let's go watch
Speaker 4: a Falcon Saints game together.
Speaker 2: Yes we will.
Speaker 1: We'll go watch Falcon Saints their new coach, Arthur Smith.
Speaker 1: I don't know if if you're.
Speaker 2: A great dude, smart guy.
Speaker 1: And they drafted a running back eighth overalls guy Dejean Robinson,
Speaker 1: who he might be the best running back to inner
Speaker 1: the league since like Sakuon Barkley. So I feel very
Speaker 1: good about the Falcons, but I always do in May.
Speaker 1: So that's my feeling of confidence for you.
Speaker 4: I was with me all right, guys, thank you so much.
Speaker 1: Dear Cross is funny, Aaron. This is the goal of
Speaker 1: the podcast. We're going to get you the Arthur Smith interview.
Speaker 1: You're craving. We're gonna get you the you know, the
Speaker 1: offensive line coach of the Saints someday. But I also
Speaker 1: want to bring on guys that I love who have
Speaker 1: entertained me for years. David Cross is hilarious In Arrested Development,
Speaker 1: he was down playing it almost there, and yet I
Speaker 1: think that just scratches the surface. You hurt my feelings
Speaker 1: movie was talking about, which he was like, yeah, Julia
Speaker 1: Louis Dreyfus is the star. That's a major star that
Speaker 1: opens May twenty sixth, Justified City Primeval airs July eighteenth,
Speaker 1: and then he's on tour Tuesday, the day after Memorial Day.
Speaker 1: He's in Denver, where he said he's been sold out.
Speaker 1: But Aaron David Cross cool as hell. Yeah, I loved it.
Speaker 3: I also love as an actor from arrest Development. He's
Speaker 3: a Falcons fan, and I think Falcons. This is I'm
Speaker 3: pushing this wordplay a little too hard, but I think
Speaker 3: Falcons might think their offense is in a state of
Speaker 3: arrested development. And there we go. We tied it in perfectly.
Speaker 1: Why I love you. I don't even know what the
Speaker 1: state of arrested development would be, and yet it works. Guys,
Speaker 1: Till next week, We've got more of these kind of
Speaker 1: guests that are comedians, actors, entertainers. We're proactively seeking them out,
Speaker 1: like this is the off season and I'm bringing on
Speaker 1: guys and gals that I think are interesting.
Speaker 2: And I don't know if you're getting.
Speaker 5: That Chipmunks three chipwreck story anywhere else, but I'll take it.
Speaker 5: Unbelievable behind the curtain, David Cross, nowhere else in podcasting
Speaker 5: are you going to hear about Thursday night Flex scheduling
Speaker 5: right into the Mister Show, Mister show. I was gonna
Speaker 5: say chip Wreck, Yeah, Chipreck Carnival Cruise Lines. If you
Speaker 5: want to be a sponsor, we're open and amenable to it,
Speaker 5: if you want to be Just so it is until
Speaker 5: next week.
Speaker 1: Because my name is Peter Schrager. This is Aaron Wan Kauffman.
Speaker 1: Our guest was David Cross, the incredible comedian and actor.
Speaker 1: Jason English is here back in la We got Matt Schneider,
Speaker 1: Jason Cleman, and Meredith Batton who they all run the
Speaker 1: show and all the stuff that you're seeing on digital.
Speaker 1: But gosh, couldn't be happier with today's episode. We got
Speaker 1: more to come. Thanks for listening. The Season with Peter
Speaker 1: Schrager is a production of the NFL and partnership with iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you get your podcasts.